1. Pestilence Outbreaks:
Right now increasing the level of the outbreak only increases the reward for the boss drop, so there’s no point increasing this until you’re just about to fight the boss. I’d like to see an increase in mob drops based on what tier you’re in. It just makes sense to add a better challenge + reward to the area.
2. Recipes:
Having to find food/basic house crafting recipes out in the wild from random drops is weird and often mistimed. I’m still finding ones I didn’t have, and I’ve completed the game. A few days ago I got a recipe for an iron shovel…?
I’d rather see these available at their relevant shops. You can keep the armor/weapon recipes drop from pestilence bosses, bounties, and the odd store refresh, that’s fine by me.
3. Crafting & Craftsmen in general:
As mentioned before, I’m still getting random recipes like “simple stove” and whatnot, even though my house is already decked out with all the best items. My suggestion is to remove the ability to straight-up purchase the finished items (chairs, tables, containers etc.) from the craftsman, instead, you purchase a recipe and then construct it there using the craftsman’s facilities. Now that you no longer need to hope for the recipes to drop, instead being readily available for you, you can craft as needed.
Remove station items like furnaces, stoves and looms from being purchased completely, as this greatly reduces the need to interact with the town in general. If I can just teleport straight to my house, do everything there and then teleport back out it leads to a reduced sense of being within a world when you don’t really have to interact with it as much.
To offset the reduced items for your home, focus more on items that make your house look cool, armor stands, maybe add trophy cases, banners, maybe you want to brag about some giant fish you caught in a fishing event so you put it on display. Different styles of chair, maybe from different zones or factions that you can learn can still be available as drops to hunt for, but the basic framework should be there from the start. You could even introduce a buff gained for having a well fleshed out house, similar Valheim’s Rested bonus where each piece from a category of item gives +1 to duration.
4. Continuing in this same area… Chef & Inn:
Right now I’ve spent all those resources on upgrading the Chef’s place but I have ZERO reason to go there after buying up the recipes as I can just do it all at home and I get all the resources I need from casually grinding. Why would I ever go there? Maybe allow food made at the Chefs place to have some bonus effect like for example +regen.
With the inn, again, now that I have a bed there is ZERO reason to go there, which is sad because a.) I paid to have this place upgraded and b.) you devs have put work into making that place have some cool interactions, like that lady that is feeling shit that you can convince to go unwind, or the Balak Taw & friend.
What I would love to see here is a minigame, something that can be played here and maybe in other major hubs, rolling dice, card games, anything, to make (or lose) a bit of money and just give a reason to revisit. Maybe you can even play vs. your friends when multiplayer comes out.
5. Food:
There are too many recipes and caused me, and I’m sure others, to wonder too much about which was the right food to have AND also have too many slots taken up with random stacks single food items which clogged up the selection wheel when trying to go from one to another.
There should be max of 3 per tier of progress:
- A basic +hp food - made from farmable ingredients
- A greater +hp food - made from farmable ingredients + meats (since gatherable without special equipment)
- A greater +hp +small % dmg reduction buff food - made from fish + farmable items. This gives a clearer reason to fish and benefit for the general rarity of ingredients/cost of interaction.
The other bonuses, such as stamina regen, focus gain, damage etc. should be left to potion intake.
Basic herbs can retain their use if needed.
6. Resting:
I’d love to see this cycle through the world’s day/night hours, maybe make a full hp recharge take 8 hours and then as they rest they see the light changing through the windows. Leave the exp buff as bonus for logging out for 4 hours like it was before, you’ve done some great things to encourage more casual play with allowing construction timers to continue while offline, allowing the exp boost to be used a catchup system would lean into this again, like you had it previously. The current system of having the player touch a bed for 5 seconds and off they go is a complete letdown. Maybe the exp gain buff can last longer depending on the general level of how well your house is decked out.